1981 IRISH HUNGER STRIKE

The '1981 Irish hunger strike' was the culmination of a five-year protest during the Troubles by Irish republican prisoners in Northern Ireland. The protest began as the blanket protest in 1976, when the British government withdrew Special Category Status for convicted paramilitary prisoners. In 1978 the dispute escalated into the dirty protest, where prisoners refused to wash and covered the walls of their cells with excrement. 1980 saw seven prisoners participate in the first hunger strike, which ended after 53 days.^[1]
The second hunger strike took place in 1981, and was a showdown between the prisoners and the British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher. One hunger striker, Bobby Sands, was elected as a Member of Parliament during the strike, prompting media interest from around the world.^[2] By the end of the strike, ten prisoners had starved themselves to death including Sands, and 100,000 people attended his funeral. The strike radicalised nationalist politics, and was the driving force that enabled Sinn Féin to become a mainstream political party.^[3]

Contents

Background

First hunger strike

Second hunger strike

Participants who died on hunger strike

Other participants in the hunger strike

Consequences

Commemorations

References

External links

Background

There had been Irish republican hunger strikes since 1917, and twelve men had previously died on hunger strike including Thomas Ashe, Terence MacSwiney, Seán McCaughey, Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg.^[4] After the introduction of internment in 1971, Long Kesh—later known as HM Prison Maze—was run as a prisoner of war camp. Internees lived in dormitories and disciplined themselves with military-style command structures, drilled with dummy guns made from wood, and held lectures on guerrilla warfare and revolutionary politics.^[5] Convicted prisoners were refused the same rights as internees until July 1972, when Special Category Status was introduced following a hunger strike by 40 Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) prisoners led by the veteran republican Billy McKee. Special Category, or political, status meant prisoners were treated very like prisoners of war, for example, not having to wear prison uniforms or do prison work. In 1976, as part of the policy of "criminalisation", the British Government brought an end to Special Category Status for paramilitary prisoners in Northern Ireland. The policy was not introduced for existing prisoners, but for those convicted after 1 March 1976.^[6] The end to Special Category Status was a serious threat to the authority which the paramilitary leaderships inside prison had been able to exercise over their own men, as well as being a propaganda blow.

First hunger strike

On 14 September 1976 newly convicted prisoner Kieran Nugent began the blanket protest, in which IRA and Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) prisoners refused to wear prison uniform and either went naked or fashioned garments from prison blankets. In 1978, after a number of attacks on prisoners leaving their cells to "slop out" (i.e., empty their chamber pots), this escalated into the dirty protest, where prisoners refused to wash and smeared the walls of their cells with excrement.^[7] These protests aimed to re-establish their political status by securing what were known as the "Five Demands":
# The right not to wear a prison uniform;
# The right not to do prison work;
# The right of free association with other prisoners, and to organise educational and recreational pursuits;
# The right to one visit, one letter and one parcel per week;
# Full restoration of remission lost through the protest.^[8]
Initially, this protest did not attract a great deal of attention, and even the IRA regarded it as a side-issue compared to their armed campaign.^[9][10] It began to attract attention when Tomás Ó Fiaich, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, visited the prison and condemned the conditions there.^[11] In 1979, former MP Bernadette McAliskey stood in the election for the European parliament on a platform of support for the protesting prisoners, and won 5.9% of the vote across Northern Ireland, even though Sinn Féin had called for a boycott of this election.^[12][13] Shortly after this, the broad-based National H-Block/Armagh Committee was formed, on a platform of support for the "Five Demands", with McAliskey as its main spokesperson.^[14][15] The period leading up to the hunger strike saw a campaign of assassination carried out by both sides. The IRA shot and killed a number of prison officers;^[16] while loyalist paramilitaries shot and killed a number of activists in the National H-Block/Armagh Committee and badly injured McAliskey and her husband in an attempt on their lives.^[17][18]
On 27 October 1980, republican prisoners in HM Prison Maze began a hunger strike. Many prisoners volunteered to be part of the strike, but a total of seven were selected to match the number of men who signed the Proclamation of the Republic in Easter, 1916. The group consisted of IRA members Brendan Hughes, Tommy McKearney, Raymond McCartney, Tom McFeeley, Sean McKenna, Leo Green, and INLA member John Nixon.^[19] After a few weeks three prisoners in Armagh Women's Prison joined the strike including Mairéad Farrell, and then a short-lived hunger strike by several dozen more prisoners in HM Prison Maze. In a war of nerves between the IRA leadership and the British government, with McKenna lapsing in and out of a coma and on the brink of death, the government appeared to concede the essence of the prisoners' five demands with a thirty page document detailing a proposed settlement. With the document in transit to Belfast, Hughes took the decision to save McKenna's life and end the strike after 53 days on 18 December.

Second hunger strike

A hunger strike memorial in Milltown Cemetery, Belfast.

In January 1981 it became clear that the prisoners' demands had not been conceded. Prison authorities began to supply the prisoners with officially issued civilian clothing, whereas the prisoners demanded the right to wear their own clothing. On 4 February the prisoners issued a statement saying that the British government had failed to resolve the crisis and declared their intention of "hunger striking once more".^[20] The second hunger strike began on 1 March, when Bobby Sands, the IRA Officer Commanding (OC) in the prison, refused food. Unlike the first strike, the prisoners joined one at a time and at staggered intervals, which they believed would arouse maximum public support and exert maximum pressure on the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.^[21]
The republican movement initially struggled to generate public support for the second hunger strike. The Sunday before Sands began his strike 3,500 people marched through west Belfast, during the first hunger strike four months earlier the marchers had numbered 10,000.^[22] However five days into the strike Frank Maguire, the Independent Republican MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone, died resulting in a by-election. There was debate among nationalists and republicans regarding who should contest the election, Austin Currie of the Social Democratic and Labour Party expressed an interest, as did Bernadette McAliskey and Maguire's brother Noel. After negotiations, and implied threats to Noel Maguire, they agreed not to split the nationalist vote by contesting the election and Sands stood as an Anti H-Block candidate against Ulster Unionist Party candidate Harry West.^[23] Following a high-profile campaign the election took place on 9 April, and Sands was elected to the British House of Commons with 30,492 votes to West's 29,046.^[24]
Sands' election victory raised hopes that a settlement could be negotiated, but Margaret Thatcher stood firm in refusing to give concessions to the hunger strikers. She stated "We are not prepared to consider special category status for certain groups of people serving sentences for crime. Crime is crime is crime, it is not political".^[25] The world's media descended on Belfast, and several intermediaries visited Sands in an attempt to negotiate an end to the hunger strike, including Síle de Valera, granddaughter of Éamon de Valera, the personal envoy of Pope John Paul II and European Commission of Human Rights officials.^[26] With Sands close to death, the government's position remained unchanged, with Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Humphrey Atkins stating "If Mr. Sands persisted in his wish to commit suicide, that was his choice. The Government would not force medical treatment upon him".
On 5 May, Sands died in the prison hospital on the sixty-sixth day of his hunger strike, prompting rioting in nationalist areas of Northern Ireland. Humphrey Atkins issued a statement saying that Sands had committed suicide "under the instructions of those who felt it useful to their cause that he should die".^[27] Over 100,000 people lined the route of his funeral, which was conducted with full IRA military honours. Margaret Thatcher showed no regret for his death, telling the House of Commons that "Mr. Sands was a convicted criminal. He chose to take his own life. It was a choice that his organisation did not allow to many of its victims".
In the two weeks following Sands' death, three more hunger strikers died. Francis Hughes died on 12 May resulting in further rioting in nationalist areas of Northern Ireland, in particular Derry and Belfast. Following the deaths of Raymond McCreesh and Patsy O’Hara on 21 May, Tomás Ó Fiaich, by then Primate of All Ireland, criticised the British government's handling of the hunger strike. Despite this Margaret Thatcher refused to negotiate a settlement, stating "Faced with the failure of their discredited cause, the men of violence have chosen in recent months to play what may well be their last card", during a visit to Belfast in late May.
A number of protesting prisoners contested the general election in the Republic of Ireland in June. Kieran Doherty and Paddy Agnew (who was not on hunger strike) were elected in Cavan-Monaghan and Louth respectively, and Joe McDonnell narrowly missed election in Sligo-Leitrim.^[28][29] There were also local elections in Northern Ireland around that time and although Sinn Féin did not contest them, some smaller groups and independents who did support the hunger strikers had a few successes, e.g. the Irish Independence Party won 21 seats, while the Irish Republican Socialist Party (the INLA's political wing) and People's Democracy (a Trotskyist group) won two seats each.^[30] The British government rushed through the Representation of the People Act 1981 to prevent another prisoner contesting the second by-election in Fermanagh and South Tyrone, which was due to take place following the death of Sands.

A memorial to hunger striker Kieran Doherty.

Following the deaths of Joe McDonnell and Martin Hurson the families of some of the hunger strikers attended a meeting on 28 July with Catholic priest Father Denis Faul. The families expressed concern at the lack of a settlement to the priest, and a decision was made to meet with Gerry Adams later that day. At the meeting Father Faul put pressure on Adams to find a way of ending the strike, and Adams agreed to ask the IRA leadership to order the men to end the hunger strike.^[31] The following day Adams held a meeting with six of the hunger strikers to outline a proposed settlement on offer from the British government should the strike be brought to an end.^[32] The strikers rejected the settlement, believing that accepting anything less than the "Five Demands" would be a betrayal of the sacrifice made by Bobby Sands and the other men who had died.^[33]
On 31 July the hunger strike began to break, when the mother of Paddy Quinn insisted on medical intervention to save his life. The following day Kevin Lynch died, followed by Kieran Doherty on 2 August, Thomas McElwee on 8 August and Michael Devine on 20 August.^[34] On the day Devine died, Sands' election agent Owen Carron won the Fermanagh and South Tyrone by-election with more votes but with a reduced majority.^[35] On 6 September the family of Laurence McKeown became the fourth family to intervene and asked for medical treatment to save his life, and Cardinal Daly issued a statement calling on republican prisoners to end the hunger strike. A week later James Prior replaced Humphrey Atkins as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and met with prisoners in an attempt to end the strike. Liam McCloskey ended his strike on 26 September after his family said they would ask for medical intervention if he became unconscious, and it became clear that the families of the remaining hunger strikers would also intervene to save their lives. The strike was called off on 3 October 1981, and three days later Prior announced partial concessions to the prisoners, including the right to wear their own clothes at all times.

Participants who died on hunger strike

Over the summer, ten hunger strikers died. Their names, paramilitary affiliation, dates of death, and length of hunger strike are as follows:

Name	Paramilitary affiliation	Date of death	Length of strike	Reason for imprisonment
Bobby Sands	IRA	5 May	66 days	Possession of a firearm
Francis Hughes	IRA	12 May	59 days	Various offences, including the murder of a soldier
Raymond McCreesh	IRA	21 May	61 days	Attempted murder, possession of a rifle, IRA membership
Patsy O’Hara	INLA	21 May	61 days	Possession of a hand grenade
Joe McDonnell	IRA	8 July	61 days	Possession of a firearm
Martin Hurson	IRA	13 July	46 days	Attempted murder, involvement in explosions, IRA membership
Kevin Lynch	INLA	1 August	71 days	Stealing shotguns, taking part in a punishment shooting
Kieran Doherty	IRA	2 August	73 days	Possession of firearms and explosives, hijacking
Thomas McElwee	IRA	8 August	62 days	Manslaughter
Michael Devine	INLA	20 August	60 days	Theft and possession of firearms

Other participants in the hunger strike

Although ten men died during the course of the hunger strike, thirteen others began refusing food but were taken off hunger strike, either due to medical reasons or after intervention by their families. Many of them still suffer from the effects of the strike with problems including digestive, visual, physical and neurological disabilities.^[36][37]

Name	Paramilitary affiliation	Strike ended	Length of strike	Reason for ending strike
Brendan McLaughlin	IRA	26 May	13 days	Suffering from a perforated ulcer and internal bleeding
Paddy Quinn	IRA	31 July	47 days	Taken off by his family
Patrick McGeown	IRA	20 August	42 days	Taken off by his family
Matt Devlin	IRA	4 September	52 days	Taken off by his family
Laurence McKeown	IRA	6 September	70 days	Taken off by his family
Bernard Fox	IRA	24 September	32 days	His medical condition deteriorated
Liam McCloskey	INLA	26 September	55 days	It became clear that his family would intervene to save his life if he became unconscious
Hugh Carville	IRA	3 October	34 days	End of hunger strike
James Devine	IRA	3 October	13 days	End of hunger strike
Gerard Hodgkins	IRA	3 October	20 days	End of hunger strike
Jackie McMullan	IRA	3 October	48 days	End of hunger strike
John Pickering	IRA	3 October	27 days	End of hunger strike
Patrick Sheehan	IRA	3 October	55 days	End of hunger strike

Consequences

A hunger strike memorial in Derry's Bogside.

The hunger strike was a Pyrrhic victory for Margaret Thatcher and the British government. Thatcher became a republican hate figure of Cromwellian proportions, with Danny Morrison describing her as "the biggest bastard we have ever known".^[38] There was extensive international condemnation of the British government's handling of the hunger strike, and the relationship between the British and Irish governments was strained. As with internment in 1971 and Bloody Sunday in 1972, IRA recruitment was boosted resulting in a new surge of paramilitary activity. There was an upsurge of violence after the comparatively quiet years of the late 1970s, with widespread civil disorder in Northern Ireland and rioting outside the British Embassy in Dublin. Security forces fired 29,695 plastic bullets in 1981 causing seven deaths, compared to a total of around 16,000 bullets and four deaths in the eight years following the hunger strikes.^[39] The IRA continued its armed campaign during the seven months of the strike, killing thirteen policemen, eight soldiers, five members of the Ulster Defence Regiment and five civilians. The seven months were one of the bloodiest periods of the Troubles with a total of 61 people killed, 34 of them civilians. Three years later the IRA tried to take their revenge on Thatcher with the Brighton hotel bombing, an attack on the Conservative party conference which killed five people, and Thatcher herself narrowly escaped death.
The hunger strike prompted Sinn Féin to move towards electoral politics—Sands' election victory combined with that of pro-hunger strike candidates in the Northern Ireland local elections and Dáil elections in the Republic of Ireland gave birth to the armalite and ballot box strategy, with Gerry Adams remarking "His [Sands] victory exposed the lie that the hunger strikers—and by extension the IRA and the whole republican movement—had no popular support".^[40] The election victories of Doherty and Agnew also had political impact in the Republic of Ireland, as they denied power to Charles Haughey's outgoing Fianna Fáil government. In 1982 Sinn Féin won five seats in the elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly, and in 1983 Gerry Adams won a seat in the UK general election.^[41] As a result of the political base built during the hunger strike, Sinn Féin continued to grow in the following two decades, and it is currently the largest nationalist party in Northern Ireland holding 28 out of 108 seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly.^[42]
In 2005, the role of Gerry Adams was questioned by former prisoner Richard O'Rawe, who was the public relations officer inside the prison during the strike. O'Rawe states in his book ''Blanketmen'' that Adams prolonged the strike as it was of great political benefit to Sinn Féin and allowed Owen Carron to win Sands' seat.^[43][44] This claim is denied by several hunger strikers and Brendan McFarlane, who was OC inside the prison during the hunger strike.^[45]

Commemorations

A hunger strike memorial near Crossmaglen, County Armagh.

There are memorials and murals in memory of the hunger strikers in towns and cities across Ireland including Belfast, Dublin, Derry, Crossmaglen and Camlough.^[46][47] Annual commemorations take place across Ireland for each man who died on the hunger strike, and an annual hunger strike commemoration march is held in Belfast each year, which includes a Bobby Sands memorial lecture.^[48][49] Several towns and cities in France have named streets after Bobby Sands, including Paris and Le Mans.^[50] The Iranian government also named a street running alongside the British embassy in Tehran after Bobby Sands, which was formerly called Winston Churchill Street.^[51]
In 1997 the people of Hartford, Connecticut, in the United States dedicated a monument to Bobby Sands and the other hunger strikers.^[52] The monument stands in a traffic circle known as "Bobby Sands Circle", at the bottom of Maple Avenue near Goodwin Park.^[53] On 20 March 2001 Sinn Féin's national chairperson Mitchel McLaughlin opened the National Hunger Strike Commemoration Committee's exhibition at the Europa Hotel in Belfast, which included three original works of art from Belfast-based artists.^[54] A separate exhibition was also launched in Derry the following month.^[55] Two films have been made based on the events of the hunger strike, ''Some Mother's Son'' starring Helen Mirren, and ''H3'' which was co-written by former hunger striker Laurence McKeown.

References

1. The Hunger Strike of 1981 - A Chronology of Main Events
2. Remembering Bobby Sands David McKittrick
3. Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin, , Peter, Taylor, Bloomsbury Publishing, ,
4. Finely Tempered Steel: Sean McCaughey and the IRA, , Mairtin Óg, Meehan, Republican Publications, ,
5. Ten Men Dead, , David, Beresford, Atlantic Monthly Press, ,
6. A Chronology of the Conflict - 1976
7. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', p. 220.
8. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', pp. 229–234.
9. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', p. 217.
10. INLA Deadly Divisions, , , Holland, Jack & McDonald, Henry, Poolbeg, ,
11. The deaths that gave new life to an IRA legend David Beresford
12. The 1979 European elections Nicholas Whyte
13. A View North Anniversaries recall the rise of Sinn Féin Jack Holland
14. ''Ten Men Dead'', pp. 21–22.
15. Abstracts on Organisations - 'N'
16. ''Ten Men Dead'', p. 20.
17. Loyalists, , Peter, Taylor, Bloomsbury Publishing, ,
18. UDA Inside the Heart of Loyalist Terror, , , McDonald, Henry & Cusack, Jim, Penguin Books, ,
19. Blanketmen, , Richard, O'Rawe, New Island, ,
20. Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA, , Richard, English, Pan Books, ,
21. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', p. 237.
22. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', pp. 239–240.
23. A Secret History of the IRA, , Ed, Moloney, Penguin Books, ,
24. Westminster By-election (NI) - Thursday 9 April 1981
25. What happened in the hunger strike?
26. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', pp. 242–243.
27. The Crowned Harp: policing Northern Ireland, , , Ellison, Graham & Smyth, Jim, Pluto Press, ,
28. The Long War: The IRA and Sinn Féin, , Brendan, O'Brien, Syracuse Univ Pr, ,
29. Sligo hunger striker's death to be remembered
30. A History of the Irish Working Class, , Peter, Berresford Ellis, Pluto Press, ,
31. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', p. 248.
32. ''Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA'', p. 202.
33. Brits, , Peter, Taylor, Bloomsbury Publishing, ,
34. ''Provos The IRA & Sinn Féin'', pp. 249–251.
35. Fermanagh and South Tyrone 1973–1982 Nicholas Whyte
36. Hunger striker in fight for sight Allison Morris
37. Ex-IRA hunger striker criticises 'celebrations' Tom Peterkin
38. ''Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA'', pp. 207–208.
39. ''The Long War: The IRA and Sinn Féin'', p. 44.
40. ''Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA'', p. 200.
41. Abstentionism: Sinn Féin Ard Fheis, 1–2 November 1986
42. DUP top in NI assembly election
43. The legacy of the hunger strikes Melanie McFadyean
44. 'The Blanket' meets 'Blanketmen' Anthony McIntyre
45. Former comrades' war of words over hunger strike Steven McCaffrey
46. Hunger strike monument rededicated
47. Hunger Strike Commemoration kicks off in Dublin
48. Remembering 1981: Hurson Anniversary marked across the country
49. Collusion highlighted during Hunger Strike weekend
50. French intelligentsia ponders what should be done with killer Colin Randall
51. Naming Bobby Sands Street Pedram Moallemian
52. Hunger Strikers remembered in US Christy Mac an Bhaird
53. Irish struggle long backed in Hartford
54. Hunger strike exhibition launched Peadar Whelan
55. Hunger strike exhibition launched

External links

★ Bobby Sands Trust

★ Irish Hunger strike Commemorative Project

★ Hunger Strikers Memorial, Hartford, CT, USA

★ Chicago Hunger Strike Commemoration Committee

★ FAIR Research and Policy Unit (A Unionist organisation)